I didn't want to rant about work here but this deserves an honorable mention.
I work IT from 7 to 6 on a Factory which I won't disclose here but we do medical stuff which pretty much makes for an interesting experience since you actually have to know how the whole process works to understand what you're doing to the PC and how it'll affect the whole thing.
For over a year now we've tried 6 times to get these old ass Windows 2000 PC's running on obsolete workstations to move from our main network into a segregated one over a VLAN.
Woah, wait, what is all this shit I'm talking about? Let me explain it to you.
Our company has a policy that states that obsolete PC's should not be inside our network since they're a haven for viruses and the like so we have to get them out of the way or move them to a segregated section of the network with no access to any other computers or the internet so they'll remain there until they rot into fucking extintion... it is most likely that the extition of humanity will happen first but regardless of the point we still have to do it.
So how do you pull out this technical mumbo-jumbo I'm talking about?
You make the network think they're not there. Sounds weird? Not really, computers and switches or routers can do amazing things nowadays that could have never been performed some 10 years ago and let's not even go back to the 60's because that's fucking scary.
Inside the switch, a Cisco Switch, which is the device that allows you to connect multiple PC's into your network you do this crazy magical voodoo shit. Think of it as a river that has a delta and keeps forking everywhere but you have to cut out one of the forks because it is in danger of being infested with mosquitos with malaria or some other really fucked up disease you're only supposed to see over in Africa. You do this by putting a dam on its way and that is exactly what we are trying to do, putting up a dam on it so it won't go back up and we can only control what and how much exactly goes down there.
Now this sounds easy but apparently it is not since I've stated before that this is our sixth time trying this out and let me tell you everytime it has been the same shit. We segregate, we reboot and we pray it works but unfortunately God, a Deity, an Icon or whatever it is that you or the IT people praise, maybe the Machine God, hates us like you have no clue.
We've had people look directly into the code for the program, built in fucking Visual Basic 6 which has been obsolete now for some good... 10 years maybe and scares the fuck out of me since we're not supposed to be seeing this kind of things on this time and age, but anyway they fucked around with it and got it to work on a test environment but as soon as you pass it into the real deal it blows up and nothing works. First time we were confused and scared shitless since NOTHING, FUCKING, WORKED, even after returning them they wouldn't work but to our luck some asiatic chick from Texas figured it out and we were saved...
Since then it has downspiralled into an orgy of ideas, tweaking and fucking around with things that as I've mentioned before SHOULD BE LEFT AS THEY ARE. In IT there's a Golden rule that I believe is also a Golden rule everywhere, if it works DO NOT FUCK WITH IT. But yeah you get those assholes upstairs to understand that and they'll tell you Windows 2000 just came out yesterday and that McAfee is the best antivirus ever... right.
So today was our sixth try, yeah sixth, and guess what? It failed... wow I'm surprised guys, I thought the third time we would have understood that we're outgunned and outmatched by something probably built back in '98 by someone that doesn't work for our customer anymore that had too much caffeine injected into his veins to kill a cow or maybe even a complete herd.
What is the plan of action then? Call in the guy that did the setup for this thing, who charges the modest amount of 200 dlls an hour, to get this working for us. And my veredict is that he'll fix it in five minutes or some such and he'll shit all over us, and oh he likes to shit on whoever stands on his way whenever he can, because we were too stupid to do it ourselves.
In brief kids, our lesson for today is if it works DON'T FUCK AROUND WITH IT and if you, for some god forsaken reason need to then call the guy who did it because you never know what kind of sacrifice or pact he had with Satan himself to make it work.
I'm going to deviate a little also to do a quick review of this Black Metal band from TJ, wow go figure, I'm listening to right now.
Black Blasphemy.
I've heard some Black Metal back in the day and there's a lot of shit, you'll hear this from EVERYONE including people that are deep into it and will all concur that it is like finding a diamond in a pile of shit. Fortunately I'm kind of lucky to find said diamonds around all the shit and this happens to be the case.
What does it sound like? Well... Black Metal, but the good kind and I recommend giving it a try if you want to hear something new with a nice vibe of the good ol' fuck Christianity in the ass and burn Churches, I'm looking at you Varg Vikernes, then you should give this a try.
It's raw, not raw as hell though, raspy vocals, a drum kit that sounds decent enough for Black Metal or Metal in general and guitars you can actually listen too instead of just hearing hissing everywhere.
Also there's another note of interest for this Friday, the Divan de Alicia over at 7th street Downtown is having a free gig, quite excellent and cool of them as usual, and with happy hour from 5 to 10 so you can get shit smashed and bang your head like a fucking maniac when the guys come out to play.
Here's a flyer from said event, have fun guys and hope to see you there, Vico out!
